In my restless dreams, I see that town, Silent Hill. Do you remember? We had so many wonderful times there, you and I together, and when the boys were a bit older they came along to join us. We spent long hours out on the lake with the sun shining down on us and the water glittering so peacefully. I remember how simple and happy it felt, to watch the boys play while I was wrapped in your arms. And we could see the beautiful hotel across the glimmering lake. You promised you'd take me there again someday, but you never did. I know after we lost them, it would be impossible to return with their laughter haunting the air, but I'm alone there now, in our special place, waiting for you.
Tim stood in the decaying roadside bathroom, staring into his clouded eyes which were reflected madly back to him from the cracked, grime-coated mirror. In his fist Jill's letter smoldered against his skin, he still could not wake from the bewilderment he had felt that morning when he received it. There was no address, only his name in her delicate handwriting, the ink shining as though it were wet. It had been three years since her suicide, how could she possibly have written to him? Tim looked further into the murky, rusted glass of the mirror, searching for the sanity he once possessed, fearing it all was slipping away from him. With a heavy effort he drew his head back and sighed into the muggy air of the filthy room.
Outside his car was broken down with the radio still mysteriously crackling on. 'I'm here without you baby, but you're still on my lonely mind. I think about you baby and I dream about you all the time…' the song was a cruel one, the words seeping underneath his skin as he raked his fingers through the wires, desperately trying to get the engine working again. He'd finished repairing the old gunmetal-grey Ford Convertible two years after his sons had died, and it had never given him trouble before. 'I'm here without you baby, but you're still with me in my dreams, and tonight, it's only you and me'
"God damn thing," he muttered, wiping the sweat from his brow as he climbed out from underneath the car and looked around at his surroundings. Dense, pale fog settled in from all sides, covering him as soft as sea-foam, yet cold as a wave. He walked silently, Jill's letter running through his mind, the song fading behind him. 'It gets hard but it won't take away my love…' He knew he was crazy, he'd left home without telling anyone, not caring to call in for work or even to lock the door. A dead person can't write a letter, he had said to himself, but couldn't stray from believing that Jill might still be alive somehow. The idea rumbled and snared him to life, turning his mind to fire. If she wanted him to come, he would, no matter the danger he might find, he would do anything to see her again.
"Our special place," he talked quietly amongst himself, his breath warming the icy fog. "She must mean the lake…we took the boys there a lot, they loved it. But the hotel, that was our real special place…we escaped there…could she really be waiting here for me? Could she really be alive?"
He stepped down into the cradle of the forest, leaves stirring and crunching beneath his shoes. It sounded as though he was being followed, but each time he stood frozen the sweeping footsteps were cut off, and he didn't dare look over his shoulder. Fog sifted through the gloom of the trees as he quickened his pace, the air grew colder and the rattling rush of footsteps behind him intensified. To keep himself calm Tim tried again to reason with his own scarred mind, could Jill possibly be in the town? He thought of the three years alone without her, struggling between dream and reality. Where had she gone to, all of that time? Had she left him, had she punished him? Did she blame him for the boys' deaths? And now, was she here, waiting for him, waiting to heal all of his wounds, to finally show him the truth? His head reeled through the icy fog, dampening the material of his deep green jacket. The thought of her alive, to see her again, what if it turned out to be a dream? A dream that imprisons, a dream he could not relinquish, he would not ever let her go. Wrapped in the dreary fog, he lost himself; it was only Jill he wanted to see again, even an illusion of her, and as long as her letter called him to this haunted lonely town he would follow.
Ahead in the dense trees, Tim saw a flicker of darkening life. A branch moved gracefully, someone had been spying and flitted away. He felt the fear settle into the pit of his stomach, through the glassy fog he saw Jill staring at him from behind a silver tree. The fog evaporated, briefly, an ocean wave lifting. His heart caught fire and he called to her, eyes cracking with tears, but she faded from his vision like a veil of dust. Tim coiled his hands into fists, looking for her among the shroud of trees, a haze lifting and falling, taunting him. She was there again, gazing at him, her eyes somber and weary, her lips discolored. Her skin the color of ashes, the dead color of the mist. Tim's breath caught in his chest as he watched her leave him, the beat of his heart slowed with grief. It could not have been his Jill; it was only a phantom with ragged brown hair, born from some fever of his. But the sad lilt of her eyes haunted him. He lowered his head to escape her tantalizing phantom, tears clinging to the tassels of his lashes. Weary to step any further into the hellish town if only more spirits awaited. Had the letter been a trick? His mind was crushed by the exhausting fantasy of seeing her. He longed to return to his car, to somehow get it started and drive as far as he could where the pain could not tear him to shreds, where the memory couldn't poison and beckon. He would have turned back if it were not for their laughter.
Brad, Randy and Mark. Their laughter creeping to him through the dream-ridden fog. Tim shivered and staggered forward, wanting to call out to his sons, but finding his throat burned with fear. He dropped to his knees and covered his face, knowing it could not be real, that he had lost his family years ago. Why would they want to torture him so? He had been waiting so long to see them again, that the shock of their voices was terrifying, how could they suddenly be here? Their gleeful laughter was irresistible, they were ahead somewhere in the town, running and playing, waiting just around the tangle of trees, no longer hiding. Tim dragged himself from the freezing dirt path and followed the sound of their voices, limping from the weight of ecstasy and dread of what he would find.
The fog drifted and cleared, taking with it the boys' pleasant hollowed laughter. A pale green field stretched before Tim, lined with gloomy, flinty gray stones. Empty. His heart burst and wept with dust, led so far by wishes only to crumble. It was a cemetery.